The Souffle
by Lornesgoldenhair
Summary: Pure Whouffaldi Fluff as the Doctor tries to help Clara on her quest for the perfect soufflé.


The Soufflé

Pure Whouffaldi Fluff as the Doctor tries to help Clara on her quest for the perfect soufflé.

Rated K

'Dear Gods, Clara, what is that smell?'

Clara stopped mixing and leaned on the counter. 'It's burning Doctor,' she replied irritably, 'it's the smell of burning. Burning soufflé if you must know.'

'It's awful, open a window.'

'Thanks a lot and no, its cold outside, in case you didn't notice its snowing.'

She turned and found him wrinkling his nose and bending to peer at the contents of her oven through its glass door.

'Is it supposed to be black?' he asked. Clara folded her arms.

'What do you want?'

He straightened. 'It's Wednesday.' Clara's eyes widened.

'Oh so it is, I'm so sorry,' she wiped her hands down her apron quickly, 'I completely forgot…'

The Doctor looked at her curiously, 'You forgot?'

'Yes, I've been a bit preoccupied. Look I'll take this out the oven… uh…' she bent and opened it but was greeted by a small billow of noxious black smoke, 'Just give me a minute….'

'You forgot it was Wednesday?' he repeated.

Clara looked up from the floor where she knelt clutching the cremated soufflé. 'Yes?' she squeaked.

'You never forget. You sometimes make up excuses not to come with me but you never forget.'

'I just forgot, it's not a big deal, and I do _not_ make up excuses,' she stood with a groan and dumped the blackened soufflé on the counter. She stood looking at it feeling heat in her cheeks under his gaze. 'I just have other things to do sometimes…' she finished.

'Have you got one of those things today?' he said a little sharply.

'Yes,' she looked at him with big eyes.

'Making burned soufflés or something equally as pointless?'

'It isn't pointless,' she said a little too sharply before she forced herself to recover her cool, 'It's a thing, and I have to do it, it's important, just give me a couple more hours, I'll do the thing and you go back in your box and hop forward to tea time and then we'll do whatever you like.'

'Why are you being so mysterious about it?' the Doctor asked.

'Says the King of Mystery,' Clara protested, 'You don't have to know _everything_, Doctor.' She stared at the calendar on the wall.

The Doctor followed her gaze and then squinted at her briefly through narrowed eyes. 'Fine,' he said, 'I'll come back later,' and he turned in a flurry of furled jacket and crimson lining before stalking out of the room. Clara looked after him a little shocked, he usually put up more of a protest. He was most likely up to something. He couldn't bear not to know, he might portray himself these days as an arrogant above it all Lord of Time but she knew him better than that. His curiosity always got the better of him. He was basically nosey on an enormous scale. She sighed, if he had been his old self, her old Doctor she would just have told him what she was doing. He would have understood. Instead Clara listened as the TARDIS engines kicked in in the living room and he disappeared.

'Time for you later,' she said to herself and turned back to her embryonic soufflé. 'I just want to get this right today.' She lifted a spoon full of the mixture and watched as it plop plopped back into the bowl. She didn't hold out much hope. 'Why can I never get it?' she asked the air and the soufflé started back at her mercilessly. 'I just want it to taste like hers, just once!' She shoved the spoon back in the bowl with a splatter and went to get her coat.

The Doctor watched from the bedroom door as she left the flat. Technically he'd got 'back in his box and hopped' through time and space just as she had requested. He just hadn't got very far. He wanted to tell himself it was curiosity, the opportunity for the observation of a strange new set of behaviours centred on 'forgetting' and soufflés. He wanted to tell himself that, but really it was just concern.

It was _really_ cold. Clara pulled her jacket closer around her and was thankful she had remembered her gloves. She ducked her chin into her scarf and blew out to try and absorb some of the heat from her own breath. It was March it was supposed to be spring. The six inches of snow under foot had no right to be there. It crunched as she trudged along the path. They should clear it, someone could slip, she thought. Clara looked around her, not that there were many people here. Well not living ones anyway. She eyed a statue suspiciously as she walked past a grave. There had better not be any weeping Angels either. Graveyards officially gave her the creeps since she met the Doctor and she really might have liked his company just as reassurance but at the same time she doubted he would really understand the purpose of this trip and she would have to spend the best part of the afternoon explaining it. That would sort of defeat the point.

She broke off from the path and started to crunch across the grass instead, wending her way between the headstones , her coat occasionally brushing against their tops and knocking snow from them. She apologised in her mind to the dead as she walked, sure that she was accidentally placing her footsteps over their coffins. She wondered if someone somewhere felt the sensation of her walking over their grave.

Finally she reached the spot she sought and stopped over the headstone to brush the snowflakes from the engraving.

_Ellie Oswald_

_Beloved Wife and Mother_

_Born 11__th__ September 1960_

_Died 5__th__ March 2005_

'Hi mum,' she said.

From the same spot he had stood on almost a decade before the Doctor watched silently as Clara went about tidying her mother's grave. The snow limited what she could do but she removed the dead flowers and branches that littered it, the remains of last year's autumn, in buried frosted leaves. It made sense now and his curiosity ought to have been satisfied. He had seen this before, a younger Clara, comforted by her father, standing by the fresh grave of her mother. Ten years on she stood alone. Perhaps her father no longer made the yearly pilgrimage but Clara always would, somehow he knew that, she always gave her time, even to the dead. He shifted away from where he leant against the tree, hesitant, unsure what to do for the best, and then took a step forward.

'So it's still not working out,' Clara was saying, 'It either burns or goes flat. Or I miss out an ingredient completely because I'm worrying so much that it won't rise.'

'It can't be that complicated,' the Doctor said.

Clara started and stood up quickly half tripping over the edge of the grave. 'Doctor this is a _private_ thing, we spoke about those, things I do _alone_, without _you_.' She was about to launch into a full scale telling off when she caught his expression and stopped in her tracks. 'Doctor?'

'I didn't mean to intrude,' he said with unfamiliar gentleness. 'I just thought…'

'You thought what? You thought 'what's she up to?' and couldn't resist figuring it out? Well, well done Doctor, you got it, it's my mum's anniversary, I'm busy doing a bit of grieving and that's why I've delayed our trip to whichever alien planet it is today. Sorry for being so human.'

He paused. 'I thought maybe you could do with the company,' he said.

'Oh,' Clara softened. 'Oh I see… that's….' she turned and glanced at the grave, 'That would be nice.'

'Ok then,' he said awkwardly.

'OK.' They stood side by side for a moment reading her mother's name and the few figures that represented a lifetime. Clara looked sideways at her companion. 'Thank you,' she said quietly.

He held out his hand stiffly and she took it.

'You're welcome.'

When the snow started to fall he walked with her back to the flat and listened to her talk about her mother. He had heard a lot before of course but it was one of Clara's unique qualities that he could listen to her almost endlessly, although he would never admit it. She was still wittering about soufflés, chocolate ones and vanilla ones and ones that never rose.

'I have tried everything,' Clara said as they came in the front door, the Doctor brushing snow from his jacket and out of his hair. 'I've downloaded and photocopied so many recipes and none of them turn out right.'

'Well what's right?' he asked. 'How should they turn out?'

'Like _hers_,' she replied already ahead of him turning on the hall light and making her way to the kitchen, 'Like she used to make.'

'Some things just can't be recreated,' The Doctor said, 'No matter how hard you try.'

'It's a recipe, it can be recreated,' she called, 'Do you want some tea?'

'Coffee, and no it can't always.' He entered the kitchen and watched her fill the kettle. 'Clara?' he said quietly.

'I'm determined,' she said, 'Call it my life's quest, to taste that soufflé again.'

'Clara,' he moved forward and placed his hands on her shoulders. She spun, unused to him initiating contact since his regeneration.

'What is it?' she asked a little alarmed.

'As much as I admire that determination, there are some things that can never be recreated, your mother's soufflé is probably one of them, it wasn't the recipe that made it, it was her.'

Clara smiled sadly, 'Yes, I know…. you're right.'

'Sometimes it's best to leave the past in the past,' the Doctor said gently and then hesitated. 'Unless of course you happen to know a time lord.' He stepped to one side and gestured to the kitchen table on the far side of the room. Clara frowned, trying to focus in the dim light. What the…?

'Is that?' she asked and scuttled across to the table.

'Yes,'

Clara turned to him in excitement, 'How?'

'TARDIS.'

'Yes I got that much, how did you get it though?'

'I er…well….' He looked at her sheepishly, 'I stole it.'

'You stole a soufflé?'

'Yes.'

'From my mother?'

'Yes.'

'That's… that's…. she's going to be so upset!'

'I don't think she will be, not really, she was making it for you after all, and she can always make younger you another. For her it's just…. A bit odd, she'll blame the neighbour for pinching it.'

'She always was jealous of mums baking, 'Clara looked back at the soufflé on the table and then carefully bent over it to inhale. 'It smells just right,' she said, 'And look it's risen,' her voice cracked. The Doctor shifted uncomfortably.

'I didn't bring you a soufflé just to have you cry over it,' he said.

'It's not bad crying,' Clara said. She was suddenly energised. 'Sit down! You have to taste it.'

'Clara it's your soufflé.'

'Sit!' she trotted to the cupboards and got out two little bowls. The Doctor eased into one of the wooden chairs under the table. 'Here,' Clara began serving, 'You got it for me, you have to try it.' She sat opposite him. 'Try it!'

The Doctor lifted his spoon, 'Trying it,' he acknowledged.

'Oh my stars!' she exclaimed, 'It's perfect.'

'Of course it is, your mother made it,' he smiled at her. Clara swallowed her mouthful and looked back at him.

'That's such an odd thing to hear,' she said, 'My mum made this, probably twenty years ago and now I'm sitting here eating it, and it's like she's only just taken it out of the oven, like she's right here.' A tear slipped from her eye but she smiled.

'Clara? Clara did I do the wrong thing?'

'No! No…' she laid down her spoon and covered his hand with hers. 'It was a lovely thing.' The Doctor exhaled in relief and she laughed softly.

'You know you said some things can't be recreated,' Clara said.

'Yes,' he took a mouthful of soufflé.

'I think maybe that's been my problem. I keep looking back, trying to recreate what was.'

'We're not talking about soufflés any more are we?' The Doctor said nervously.

'No, we're not but I can use the metaphor if it makes you more comfortable?'

'Please do,' he said.

'Ok well I had this great soufflé recipe,' Clara said, 'It made really good soufflé, soufflé that I really liked,' she paused and looked at the Doctor who squirmed under her gaze.

'Get it over with,' he said, 'The metaphor is getting painful.'

'But then something happened and I don't know, I lost the recipe, it got rewritten, and the soufflé tasted different and I kept trying to find the old soufflé recipe, but I couldn't find it so I got more and more obsessed with trying to track it down, and so upset I'd lost it so much so that I forgot about the new recipe, I didn't appreciate the new soufflé. I didn't give the new soufflé credit for its unique… flavour.'

'Alright stop!' The Doctor said. 'Enough.'

'I'll always remember the old soufflé,' Clara said taking a bite, 'But that soufflé is gone and my new soufflé recipe, well it's got a lot more going for it than maybe I first realised.'

Despite himself the Doctor smiled and reached for his spoon again.

'Well thank you,' he said, 'For comparing me to pudding.'

'You compare human beings to pudding.'

'Pudding _brains_, Clara, that's a different thing.'

Clara smiled and they ate on in comfortable silence for a moment before a wide eyed Clara exclaimed, 'Wait a minute how did you steal it from my mums oven and get it into the TARDIS and all the way here without it going flat?'

The Doctor looked at her in despair.

'You're not the only one with soufflé skills, Clara.'


End file.
